This year, my first, the overall theme was Around the World. We decided to do Easter Island. We had a corner plot. The outside wall was made up of wooden spikes. Then there were 2 large stone heads, and a cool wooden gate with a sign. Inside on the first floor it was all jungle like complete with jungle noises and a pond. Then as you headed up a "stone" staircase, you cross a bridge over a stream running from the pool at the bottom of the waterfall in the corner of the booth to the pond. At the top of the stairs you crossed an actual rope bridge and then entered a bamboo-walled tiki hut. It even had special night lighting and different night jungle sounds. The greeter at the front door who led you through the jungle was Archibald Huntington. And the Chief Nahoc lived in the tiki hut.

My part was wiring and lighting with DW. My great achievement was cool looking electric tiki torches. Although I got pulled away to handle the waterfall and the ponds. That was fun but a big pain in the ass. The hard part was getting the ponds not to leak, and the stream to flow fast enough not to over flow the top pond. When it didn't work, I had to drain it and start over. I just remember that last night. First I leaned on the fire extiguisher while in the confined area under the staircase, filling the air (and my lungs) with chemicals. Then I had to siphon all the water out of the upper pond and I drank quite a bit of it. It was so cold and I felt lousy so I went to bed. But in the morning everything was great again. The other thing I remember being lots of fun was breaking rocks to line the pond, with Toon and Nate (Sledge). The scariest part of the construction was raising the hut. We had put the roof onto the stilts that connected it to the floor of the hut. Then we had to raise the whole hut 8 feet into the air and place it on another set of stilts, and it was really top heavy so it kept feeling like it was going to tip over.

Unfortunately, on Friday, at around 7pm, the tiki hut floor collapsed. Luckily no one was seriously injured, because no one was underneath. I was one of the closest people to being underneath. I had just finished turning on "night mode" and was on my way back down from the second floor after making sure the tiki torches came on. I had just gotten outside the booth when I heard a noise and turned around to see it fall.

See Pictures courtesy of Alex Perry